Abrasive articles are widely used by both consumers, manufacturers, and service providers to perform sanding and finishing operations on almost any given workpiece. Potential workpieces are diverse and can have surfaces made of plastic, wood, metal, or even ceramic materials.
Printed flexible abrasives in particular offer unique benefits to both manufacturers and consumers. The ability to impart an image to an abrasive can enhance its appearance and provide branding or promotional information. The inclusion of printed information can also be effective in communicating technical details to the end user, such as its grit size. Printing ornamental and functional images directly on the abrasive is often preferred over placing such images on product packaging because these products can easily become separated from their packaging.
Disposing a printed image onto an abrasive article can be technically challenging, because the components of an abrasive article often have limited translucency. These articles are generally made by affixing abrasive particles onto some sort of backing, which can be either rigid or flexible. In some cases, the abrasive particles are uniformly mixed with a polymeric binder to form a slurry, which is then coated onto the backing and cured to provide the final product. Alternatively, the abrasive particles can be directly adhered to the surface of the backing by partially embedding them in curable resins called “make” and “size” coats. An advantage of the latter approach is that the abrasive particles can be provided in a preferred orientation on the working surface, enabling material to be removed efficiently.
Methods for making abrasive articles that show graphic images visible from the abrasive-side of the article have been reported elsewhere, for example in provisional U.S. Patent Application Ser. No. 62/076,874 (Graham et al.).